


this, this (is history)

by etben



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Snuggling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-08-04
Updated: 2007-08-04
Packaged: 2017-10-21 18:57:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/228522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etben/pseuds/etben
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Teyla remembers a moon, cold and barren and airless, and the ship that hid inside, waiting, a seed in dead earth.  She remembers a man who lost his family, and his hope, and his peace.  She remembers his eyes, green of early summer, possibility.</p>
            </blockquote>





	this, this (is history)

"What do you remember?"

Teyla remembers a moon, cold and barren and airless, and the ship that hid inside, waiting, a seed in dead earth. She remembers a man who lost his family, and his hope, and his peace. She remembers his eyes, green of early summer, possibility.

She remembers loss, and rot, and despair.

She remembers a door, a door, another door, an endless series of broken doors, remembers the rush of emptying air. She remembers a man who destroyed his family, his friends, everything that he had ever held dear, in the hope that his people might have a future.

 _Jehmet Lerken_ , she remembers, _choreographer and musician_. He has - had - has - cancer, a wasting sickness in his blood and his bones, and his inclusion on the shuttle was controversial. She remembers him, and Ketla Narmis, and Euno Darvih, and perhaps fifty other names. She remembers poets and architects, politicians and ascetics, men and women of thought and strategy and great benevolence. She remembers what they did and who they were, why they were valued above all else.

She remembers sad old eyes, staring past her sidearm, and she remembers recognition, understanding, acceptance. She remembers two points of light - one scoring the door, connection re-established - one in the air, pulling her away.

"I remember the moon," she says, and closes her eyes.

She does not remember nearly enough.

*

Ronon is first onto the bed, claiming the spot in the corner by virtue of his shoulder and the sheer unrelenting size of him. Rodney grumbles, of course, a sharp-soft tangle of words about his back, his neck, his right to sleep "with some modicum of back support, for a change." His hands are gentle, though, painting slow arcs along her back, and he helps her out of her clothes with only the barest kiss to her forehead, nothing more.

"Come here," Ronon says, and Teyla goes, settling her legs over his lap and resting her head against his good shoulder, letting Rodney edge up behind her until he is curled with his legs behind hers, Ronon's hand resting solid and steady on his shoulder. His breath is warm and slow against the back of her neck, and his hand taps a quick, stuttering rhythm against the bones of her wrist, all half-understood meaning and shifting significance.

"Sorry," John mutters, sliding last into the room. "Elizabeth caught me in the mess - wanted to know where you were." Teyla breathes in against Ronon's shoulder, eyes shut, and listens to the soft sounds John's clothes make against the back of the chair. "I told her that I'd kicked your ass with the sticks, and that you needed some time to yourself - to recover." The bed doesn't creak as he settles on it, but she feels it all the same, the dip and sink of the mattress, the tiny motions of Rodney's arm, Ronon's feet as they all draw nearer.

"Debrief?" She's right against Ronon's throat, now, and she feels it when he talks, vibration under her lips, echoing back to her eyes and ears. John's hand rubs along her knee, smoothing and soothing, and she feels the tiny motion of his head before she hears his words.

"Wednesday," he says. "Elizabeth's busy with the Menaarians, anyway - she won't mind." Rodney hums his approval against the back of her neck, tucks his thumb into the crease of her elbow, holds her.

Teyla breathes, and breathes, and breathes, and when Rodney speaks, she is still breathing.

"Do you want to - talk?" His voice is low and careful, uncertain and unafraid, and she loves him more, just then, than any man she's ever known. She breathes, and breathes, and does not answer; Ronon kisses her forehead; John clasps her hand.

"Teyla?"

"I do not," she says, finally, expelling her air in a rush, leaving vacuum inside. "I really, truly do not." She laughs, and her throat catches, and she coughs, rocking back against Rodney's body, curling in on herself. He starts to draw away, giving her space that she neither wants nor needs, but she grabs him by the wrist and draws him closer, closer. John shifts, then, and then Ronon, and Rodney again, until she can barely breathe, pressed here between the three of them, their hands moving in restless comfort over her skin.

Jamus killed his people, raped the land they worked and loved, selected the best souls like a harvest, young buds encased in stone. None of them were over thirty-seven years old; none of them knew the plan for what it was.

When she opens her eyes, John is watching her. His head rests on Ronon's thigh, and his legs are twined awkwardly with hers, with Rodney's. He cannot be comfortable, but he does not shift or fuss. Instead, he smiles at her, reaching up with his free arm - possibly the only arm any of them have free, but it has become hard to tell - and rubs her eyebrows backwards in the way that he _knows_ she hates.

They will shift in their sleep, of course, spreading out in different constellations, finding other ways to fit together. John will roll off and sprawl at the end of the bed, gradually stealing the blankets over the course of the night until Rodney wakes up, swearing blearily, and tugs them back. Ronon will hunch further into the wall, leaning forward, and wake with aches he will not admit, but will let her soothe. Rodney will wake up all at once, flipping from sleeping to waking with sudden, helpless energy, and stare around the bed, counting heads and limbs until the world rights itself.

They'll all still be holding her, though - fingers on wrists and throats and the delicate flutter of a pulse, feet fighting for space, knees and elbows bumping and jostling.

Teyla closes her eyes once more, and breathes, and sleeps.


End file.
